TPPA Maui Ministerial mauling leaves Cthulhu "really bummed"

The final meeting of trade ministers from countries negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership concluded without reaching consensus, the final sticking point being access to markets for dairy producers and auto makers, among New Zealand, Japan, and North America

Pacific Rim trade ministers have failed to clinch a deal to free up trade between a dozen nations after a dispute flared between Japan and North America over autos, New Zealand dug in over dairy trade and no agreement was reached on monopoly periods for next-generation drugs.
[Stuff]

Cthulhu has been disheartened by public resistance and the intransigent efforts of people who insist on explaining the consequences of the Trans-Pacific Partnership to the public at large, and rightwing media brown-nosers.

Mana News

While the ministerial delegations have taken to blaming each other, the effect of popular criticism of Cthulhu's flagship plan for economy and political devastation of also half of the worlds economy cannot be denied.

A unnamed minion close to Cthulhu remarked off the record "It's a real blow, this was supposed to be an easy way to make the monkeys to most of work for us cephalopoids, which is the normal order of things. Destroying this world should have been a doddle. He's very upset, some might say 'really bummed' right now. We're trying to console him, there is reason to be hopeful, the oceans are souring and warming at a steady pace, the atmosphere is destabilizing quite nicely with CO2 levels above 400ppm, so the droughts and floods are creating quite a bit of devastation. His reputation as Cthulhu the Destroyer of Worlds is safe, we think. But these set backs weigh on him a bit."

"All is not lost. The Trade in Services Agreement is still a work in progress, and public sector assets will eventually come under our control, so these pesky popular criticisms will be come irrelevant, if they don't do what we want, we'll just starve them out."

"Of course, keeping the terms of the Trans-Pacific Partnership secret, has been an important part of the strategy, Stupid as the monkeys are, even they won't endorse a plan to simply off themselves, or at least be fitted with a brain stem collar for complete obedience to Cthulhu. Some have even tried to get the secrecy lifted[Live News]. It is almost like they are are on to us, though our research tells us it is just the natural predictable irrationality of the monkeys at work here. As fellow minion Tim Groser said, they are "politically irrelevant". It is true that mistakes were made and the monkeys found out what we were up to in health care, Intellectual property, and investment, after that it was never going to be easy."

Spokes Pirate for Pastafarian Pirates of the Pacific, Captain Jack Noodle says, "Aye, this be cause for celebration! The Trans-Pacific Partnership was brewed from Gollum spells, psychic surgery, animal sacrifice,  homoeopathy and free-market dogmatism. No significant benefits from it could be demonstrated, it is best that it fail now, rather than at a time when people have to live with its consequences."

Albinos Murdered In Tanzania Due To Superstition

From the grab bag of barking mad superstitious ignorance, I give you Tanzania's baby murdering witch doctoring.
Hard to believe that this savage(*) f#ck nuttiness still happens in the 21st century.
Let's face it, this is an insult to actual savages, many of whom would never imagine anything this perverted.
It is important to note that Tanzania is not completely untouched by civilisation, indeed they've had exposure to Christian ministry for centuries, and in a 2010 Pew survey 61.4% self identified as Christian. Still this obscene atrocity remains. Why? perhaps because ignorance is more profitable than wisdom.
Clearly education is the key to wiping out such backward behaviour,  and there has been plenty of opportunity to make that happen. If Christianity were the force for good that Christians claim it is, then surely educating people out of this nonsense would be a high priority. But instead, especially well publicised are West and Central African nations where we find churches promoting witch persecution, often directed at children while there preachers live lifestyles that many would envy in developed nations, but clearly East Africa is not immune to the glamour of destroying children for the sake of salacious ill founded fantasies about good and evil and so doing becoming a greater evil than harms with which they are they are faced by virtue of living in a world vastly more complex than the understanding that they have been given by their culture, their religious prelates, and what ever the education system has made available to the Tanzanian population. Many have been denied education in Tanzania but poverty a school fees (fees were waved in 2001) leaving many dangerlously ill educated.

Ignorant behaviour which harms children is far from exclusive to Africa of of course. Idaho, Oregon and other American states have considerable problems with religious exemptions allowing parents to medically neglect their children health problems, result child mortality 26 times the national average for faith health families. Here the ignorance is wilful, more than it is consequential to poverty and lack of opportunities for learning. And of then there is the anti vaccine hysteria and the measles epidemic.

Bitching about NZ$570 Super for comfortable retirees.

Today's top story in the DomPost is about how the New Zealand Government is shelling out over a half billion on National Superannuation to well off senior citizens.

My guess is many of these retirees got to be so comfortable, by working through their productive years while saving and/or investing, Or put another way following the instructions of the 1% in a demand side economic environment which allowed them to do so. What makes things different to now is the economy was geared towards providing a decent income for working and middle class families, rather than geared towards extracting money from working and poor New Zealanders in exchange for shelter, food and services while compensating them has little as possible for their labour.

US income distribution since 1979,
New Zealand has followed a similar path.

Since then things have changed, back then working and becoming comfortably well off was a more reasonable proposition and a good thing because it showed demand side economics worked and there was a reasonable expectation that anyone could follow that path. Now, enter the age of Gordon Gecko. "If you're getting money you better be giving something back and I don't care how little you make, along as I make much more."

Are we now supposed to break this contract with these retirees who kept up their side of the bargain because national retirement planning has been a political foot ball for 40 years.

We knew the baby boomer bubble was coming in the 70's and we did the right thing, until Gecko-esque neoliberal doctrine over took the fourth labour government. An 8% tax was levied which when into compulsory savings. Norway does something like this, and retired Norwegians get to be very comfortable indeed. Our scheme died when Roger Douglas killed it.

The baby boomer bubble has loomed of every government for the last 30 years, and every one of them has done nothing more than punt it along for the next regime to deal with.  The problem is it's in no party's short term interest to increase costs on voters, which must be done in order to generate wealth.

Thomas Pikity's, Capital in the 21st Century points out that wealth grows at 4-8% per annum while income for workers grows at about 1% per annum. it also points to how wealth is becoming entrenched in a small number of wealthy families. I see little reason to deny working people the advantage of this wealth generating mechanism other than to those who are social dominance oriented and fear a large affluent middle class and the challenge it brings to their power in politics just as it did in the 60-70s when a strong middle class protested war, fought for women's rights and the end of segregation. Often meeting brutal and sometimes lethal violence from the establishment. such over top reactionary behaviour has not been abandoned, Operation 8, and mistreatment of the Occupy movement still rings loudly "Don't mess with the silver-back alpha ape". And yet mess with them we must if we are to have a decent society, rather than the brutal savagery of Social Darwinism.

I wonder how much the 1% will think something like "Pfffft nouvo riche, they're not like us, they are takers, cut them off!" No doubt someone will be looking to means test National Super. But is not a real solution to the problem at hand.

Around the 60-70s, there were about 6 working age people for each retiree, soon we will have just two working age people per retiree. and if that is not bad enough, neoliberal economics, especially since the 1980's has left wages stagnant, while productivity has almost doubled. and what's worse since the 1980s those entering the workforce are leaving higher education with a mountain of debt. And the work force they enter is often not the local workforce, preferring to seek higher remuneration overseas.

What would be a better solution? To leverage the wealth generating capacity of investment markets, with the financial transfer tax. It will also reduce the instability of markets, and maintain growth in the economy. This kind of tax has been implemented in Europe and is working well. Additionally, a capital gains tax, would fund a universal basic income, allowing poor and low income families to drive demand and drive economy growth creating more jobs. Also enforcing a maximum salary tied to the lowest wages in a company in a ratio. Thus ensuring company profits can be reinvested in staff and growing the business, rather than be syphoned off in obscenely inflated directors fees.  The economy would respond to this stimulus within 6 months ultimately raising the tax take.

America for all its faults did deal with the problem, they set up a social security trust fund that will fund the baby boomer retirees until around 2037. But Roger Douglas, or rather Rogernomics was not that smart.





Seriously it is time to put end to the economic model of the chiseling 1%.

See also
   Stuff.co.nz - Super for rich has 570m price tag

FSM: "take a breath... It's just a movie"

While critics from major thought traditions are hyperventilating over the atrocity that is Russell Crowe's new movie, The Flying Spaghetti Monster has issued a statement...

I get why people don't love this film, there is so much that is wrong with it. However, might I suggest, that everyone take a deep breath, count to 10, and release. It is just a movie, and as a movie it is an interesting piece of story telling which suffers from just one major flaw, its plot.

Bill Maher has commented on this film too.


Later, the Flying Spaghetti Monster said of Bill's critique “I find Bill's comment curious, because I don't recall any giraffes in it, perhaps there was a random Cosmos style edit in the reel or something.”

Turning back to the movie His Noodliness remarked “It's a grim fairy tale, not to be confused with Grimm Fairy Tales, despite obvious parallels.  I noticed many things, that were jarring about this movie like everyone's wearing pants, which would be so European in the 45 centuries to come.

The movie opens with 13 year old Noah getting a coming of age blessing from his father Lemech with the aid of a magic glowing snake skin. Rather than wearing robes, the pair are setting trends in the middle east with pants. They are interrupted when Dino (the reptilian dog) turns up, with an arrow in his side, Lemech goes to tend to the animal, at this point Tubal-Cain his cousin turns up with the rest of his hunting party. After a little chat Lemech is dead, and Noah is freaked out running away from the rocks he was hiding behind. This event could set a boy up for serious mental health issues in later life.

Next we see Noah (500) with his family. He and Ham are on a rocky hill side, they look for herbs, Ham picks a pretty flower and is gently admonished, by Noah who points out that the flower creates the “seed” that is scattered by the wind to make more flowers. These guys should go ahead and sign up with Greenpeace, and the scene begs the question why aren't Rick Perry the Koch Brother's conservationists? After they are done, Noah returns to camp to rest and he's having trouble sleeping, often a sign of psychological disturbance.

There is no specific mention of the angry old man not in the room in the early stages of the film he is merely referred to as “he” or “our lord”.

Naameh: Did he speak to you?
Noah: I don't know.... I think he's going to flood the world.

These wives have names, now that's novelty for ya. The name was given to various places in the Middle East, so applying this name to a person, may just be the killer app innovation this story needs.

Shortly after Noah decides to go see grandpa Methuselah. Along the way they find a young Ila, an injured girl and the last survivor of an over run settlement.  Noah, his family, and young waif are forced to run as Tubal-Cain and his hoards run them off as pretenders to his claim on the desolated settlement home to curious looking heavily engineered iron geothermal piping. As they run off Noah is KO'ed by rock people. When he awakes, he and his family are in a pit surrounded by rock people who mostly decide to leave them in the pit. But one of the rock people says “Follow me” and leads them to Methuselah for a cup of tea. Be wary of old men who live in caves offering peculiar tasting tea, the DEA may be watching the place.  At this point Noah hallucinates the ark in addition to his usual nightmares.

Clearly, it does not dawn on him that his imagination is running wild, because grandpappy just got him totally baked.

So far there has not been a single tree in site, nor any running water. Before Noah leaves the company of his grand father, the old man gives him a seed from the garden of Eden.

Noah plants the seed, and a day or two later the rock people show up, kind a peeved that Noah got help from one of their own, Noah makes his case as best as he can but they are unmoved until a spring pops up where the seed was planted and flowers, grasses and trees spring up the same we way see in Hanna-Barbera cartoons, or these days Sponge Bob Squarepants.  So impressed were they that the rock people were they decide to help build the Ark.  So the bible had it all wrong, Noah was really just the project manager. Of course Project managers always say they built this or that, so you can see how there is room for confusion.

We also see white pigeons/doves flying towards the constructions site, which begs the question, slugs, snails, turtles and crawling insects, weta. Later a massive flock of assorted birds self organises roosts in the Ark and are then knocked by magic anaesthetic smoke that has no effect on humans. Lets assume such a gas available, the suppressed metabolism of these birds could not be low enough to prevent them from starving over the course of a year without killing them so they would still starve even though they were asleep. Even though some bears hibernate in the wild, they aren't asleep the whole time.

There is a sequence that explains, the history of the rock people. Ancient text describes the as fallen angels encrusted with rock, because the angry old guy not in the room is mad at them for helping humans live better lives through technology. So yeah this angry old guy is an anti-science anti-technology whack-job working for Cthulhu – The Destroyer or is Thule – investigation pending.  Oddly these great aliens so well protected by the burden of the rock are strangely not impervious to iron age weapons and many of them were killed. Despite having an opt-out option available to them.

Ila, who has taken to dating Shem, has trouble coping with foreplay because of the scars from the attempt to kill her as a child have left scars. And she and Shem have been at it for a few years and she appears to be having fertility issues. So concerned is she, that she discusses leaving the family with Naameh. It appears that in her mind her only worth is in child bearing. Later this causes conflict.  Naameh, goes to Methuselah, and asks for help.

Some of the locals, from Tubal-Cain's settlement set a steel bear trap, Just how many of these have ever been found in pre-Sumerian archaeological digs requires some research.

Noah's depressive psychosis deepens, he comes to the conclusion that his family should just die out after the flood. Ham can't take to the plan and sets off to the settlement to find an innocent woman to bring home.

Meanwhile Ila comes across Methuselah is the forest, he claims to be looking for berries, and enlists her help. She find none, but then he notes that she has been a part of the family for so long, that he may as well give her his blessing, he reaches out and touches her belly with his hand (his hand yeah right), and poof – magic happens. On her way back to the boat, she runs into Shem and jumps him like a cow girl – Yeehaw!

Strangely and accidentally, Ham finds a girl his age in a pit of corpses, some of whom were her family. Rather than saying help me get out of here, she threatens Ham with a rock until he shows her that he means no harm with a rag full of bread crumbs. Dating was clearly cheap in this culture, not even a single goat exchanged. There they sit for a while until it starts raining. In the rush to get to the Ark the girl steps in the bear trap. Ham frees her but injured she cannot run, they are over run by Tubal-Cain's hoards, Noah pulls Ham out of the chaos.  Ham is not exactly grateful as Noah leaves the girl behind.

The hoards arrive at the ark and the meat grinder begins, with the rock people slamming the hoards like a scout troupe crushing roaches pouring out of a disturbed nest. The hoards do eventually start to get the better of the rock people, jamming pikes in the gaps. And here is where the opt-out clause kicks in the rock people say “Forgive me” and rip off the incrustation and explode into a light beam flying home and killing a bunch of the panicked hoards at the same time. I note that they could have done this at any time, in a safe location. Perhaps even worked out a plan with the angry old guy not in the room to avoid they mess he held them responsible for creating.

As the last of the rock people emigrate out of this crap-fest, flood waters wash off most of the hoards but Tubal-Cain pokes a hole in the side of the ark and stows himself away. He is later discovered by Ham,

Water spouts pop out of the ground around the ark. And a glimpse of the spherical Earth covered in hurricane weather, runs completely at odds with the flat earth model which was maintained until about 500bce or long after the authoring of the original Cuneiform or revised Hebrew text.  These water spouts, have inspired some to push a hypothesis referred to as the Bukkaki Theory in which the crust of the earth split open and the water under pressure spurted out thus explaining the water on other celestial bodies including the Moon, Mars and Europa. The hypothesis ignores several major flaws, the release of energy from such an event would bake, if not ionise everything in the biosphere, never mind the extra ordinary accuracy of striking these objects with a jet of water from random fissures in rocks.

Ham, despite being a nice young man, out of character decides to help Tubal-Cain in the hope of revenge for the loss of his girl friend. Mental disturbance from grief seems to run in his family.

The family settles in. Screams from the out side penetrate the wooden bulk heads of the ark. And the pinnacle of a mountain has a lot of adults on it getting hosed by big waves, No children are depicted among them, kinda weird this is a horror story right? And the story is supposed to be history say some. Perhaps they forget, or like to forget that the angry old man not in the room is committing mass infanticide at this point. Ham took 5 minutes to find an innocent and even he did not come up empty. This really is kind of like Chris Christie, punishing the innocent, to get back at the few he's mad at. Noah distracts the family from the howling by telling the story of the universe, which is accompanied by an animation sequence that could almost have been ripped from Cosmos, depicting something like big bang cosmology, followed by evolution with special creation tacked on like Eeyor's tale.

Tubal-Cain makes and interesting point to Ham “Your father fills the ark with sheep while children drown” Ham does do a deal with Tubal-Cain, and they plot to ambush Noah on the beast deck.

Ila reveals that she is pregnant and Noah loses his sh*t as his psychosis deepens. He steps out on to the loading ramp yells at the sky, ponders his navel, demands to be let off the hook, before deciding, boy's – meh, girls – gotta kill 'em. Shem's Pretty much has his dad's state of mind nailed saying “Are you mad?” At this point it truly is a miracle that Noah is not a milliner by trade.

Ham pops up and announces that the beasts are rousing and eating each other, a ruse so Tubal-Cain can beat the snot out of him. So the Death Match begins. Ham is kind of stunned by the violence of the brawling, Shem turns up and is KO'ed by Tubal-Cain who is determined to finish Noah himself. While this brawl is happen the ark runs around, convenient, because it stops Tubal-Cain finishing off Shem. Imagine Tubal-Cain's surprise when Ham overcomes his shock, takes his moment and puts the knife Tubal-Cain gave him under Tubal-Cain's arm pit. While dying Tubal-Cain notes that Ham has become a man and gives back Ham's grand fathers snake skin. There seems to be a nonsense here, real men, especially those in my pirate navy avoid killing, especially homicide, and yet every male character in this film has demonstrated a clear capacity and willingness to commit every kind of killing, and that includes the angry old man not in the room.


While the brawl goes on, Ila's twin girls arrive, Noah's wife tries to hide that they are girls, Noah not dissuaded and dagger in hand, finds Ila on top of the ark holding both infants crying. She pleads to let her calm them first, and sings an old song Noah sang to her the first night they met. This seems to give him time to cool off, nurturing instincts kick in and as he holds the dagger above the new born twins and finally relents saying he cannot do it. I would suggest that this moment makes the Noah character more moral/ethical than the angry old guy not in the room. And Scene.

Next we see the ark on top of a green hill, since all the vegetation had been under water for a year, where did this grass come from? The ark didn't carry seed.

It would not be a story about Noah without the drunk ass naked bit. But so much is missing from it, The text says Ham notices that dad is passed out drunk, and when Noah sobers up rather than being grateful that he got him help, he banishes Ham, Possibly for similar reasoning that Fred Phelps Sr. might have employed. 'cause nothing says gay like happening onto your drunk ass naked patriarch and calling for help. In this film Ham leaves of his own accord, without any prospect of finding a mate, he may be opting to just off himself, given the relationship with Noah is so completely in the toilet. But even if not, Noah's potential for instability and the treachery thing would unlikely to be resolved any time soon. To make matters worse, good counsellors were really going to be hard to find.

We finish with a blessing of the twins, and Noah says “.... be fruitful and multiply.” The camera pans up to the 100% high cloud covered sky, with a magic concentric rainbow, of precisely the kind excluded by the physics of refraction.

Reaction to the film has been mixed, Christians are hating it because it's not “historically accurate” enough for them. Muslims are hating it because it depicts Noah, who they hold as a prophet. And it might loose a bunch of money for the studio so the Jews may hate it too. And rationalist atheists, hate it because it is completely unrealistic in terms, of logistics and physics, its obscene globacidal violence, and a cast of characters that would be considered a bag of ass holes in any other dramatic production.

But remember it is just a movie. Humanity survived the final seasons of Dallas, it'll survive this, It may be two hours out of your life that you'll never get back, but it's not like anyone lied to the UN to start an unjustified war. Enjoy the popcorn. Or better yet get the Smurfs movie out on DVD.

See also
   Lunar Bukkake theory

Japanese Whalers must stop suggests FSM

Today the Flying Spaghetti Monster has announced a new suggestion that "Perhaps Japan's whaling fleet would do better by refraining from ramming vessels engaged in non-violent direct action because it just gives piracy a bad name, especially while the fleet has exceeded its permits for 'scientific whaling'." Commenting on today's International court of just ruling his noodliness said "I think it is a good move, it'll be great to see the whalers take action and stay at home. I did take quite a bit of care to make sure whales evolved, it would nice to not have them driven into extinction by an industry that is it self headed for extinction."

The FSM also noted an incident in the southern ocean. "The most disturbing thing I spotted recently was when a 8000t Nisshin Maru and a 5000t fuelling vessel put literally put a squeeze on the 500t Bob Barker, that's not what real piracy is all about, it's a black mark on the tradition of the pirate traders of colonial America who dedicated themselves to supplying colonists with affordable tea and coffee and breaking the evil empire of the East India Company."



At least the Somalis have a genuine desperation to support their case for the most part, but Japan's whaling fleet is producing a product that no one really wants, and even ends up being dumped, after storage in industrial deep freeze storage. Piracy as busy work is just plain silly, and when associated with destructive and pointless activity, barking mad. If i Didn't know better, I could swear they were working for Cthulhu the destroyer.

Many might be wondering how the industry survives with no market, Americans call it corporate socialism. Members of Japan's political system who have perhaps too much in common with Strom Thurman, Louie Gohmert, Mitch McConnell, who would supported by people who have much in common with Fox New's audience all have fond memories whale meat on their plates which was introduced to ensure an adequate level of protein in the Japanese diet after World War II when Japan was a mess, and would have mass had starvation with out it. Nowadays, there are better options with less mercury. And then there is the cultural thing, a few coastal villages did take advantage of whale strandings, and harvest whale meat that way but whale hunting was never really a thing until American advisers showed them how. Most other villages exalted whales in a religious way, so for them and those of their tradition whaling is a sacrilege.

The MV Bob Barker, is currently docked in Port Of Wellington, and today was the last day in which they were having free public tours. Well worth the 30-40 mins. The ship itself has a very interesting history, she may not look it but she is 60years old. The working life of most vessels is 30years. They don't make the quality high carbon steel she's made from any more. She is basically a floating fuel tank, this gives her the capacity to stay in antarctic waters for the full season.  And it does help that the whaling fleet is as welcome as a fart in a elevator car, the first task is finding the fleet, a task made easier when other vessels like tourist ships are willing to give away the fleets location. And this has happened on a number of occasions.

In February, a harpoon ship the Yushim Maru #3 pulled a sharp turn across the Bob Barkers bow causing a collision, while the whalers and their friends like to claim the Bob Barker rammed them, you can see by the video, that the Bob Barker does not turn with respect to the waves until it is struck. Ignore the wake, and keep in mind that since the camera is mounted on the Yushin Maru #3 and can create the false impression that the world including near by vessels are turning when the Yushin Maru #3 is turning, so the trick(clever thing - not doing climate gate again) is to see how the Bob Barker is moving in relation to the ocean. The evidence here is the Bob Barker is moving in a straight line, and the whalers are moving into straight lying.

See also
  3News: International Court of Justice - Japanese Whaling not scientific & must stop.
  Scoop: Yushin Maru No 3 hits Bob Barker
  Telegraph: Yushin Maru #3 cuts off Bob Barker[VIDEO]

Thousands say no TPPA

Today thousands of New Zealanders marched demanding an end to the secrecy surrounding the TPPA negotiations. Including and estimated 500 at parliament. People from all walks of life and across the political spectrum. While next to nothing of any substance has been officially announced to the public, negotiators themselves have said there will be little in it for New Zealand.
What is known about the TPPA comes from leaked documents available at wikileaks.
Three things stick out as big concerns for New Zealanders.
Pharmac negotiates for cheap medications, this is likely to be seriously curtailed, either preemptively by Pharmac soft balling to avoid suit under the investor-state disputes chapter, or by suits claiming lost profits by pharmaceutical corporations seeking compensation from the tax payer.
SOPA the "Stop Online Piracy Act" tabled in the US house of Representatives, was so awfully unworkable it would break the internet, and so clearly hideous that not only were there street protests, even Google and Wikipedia protested it with 24hour black outs.
The ability of government to legislate for the public good will be subordinated to good of multinational corporations in member countries. Philip-Morris in Hong Kong could sue the tax payer for lost profits if we implement plain packaging as Australia did. There is already a pending case against Australia for their plain packaging law.

The thing that bothers most critics of this "treaty" is the unusual secrecy with which it is being negotiated. Even US Senators have publicly complained they can only read the text if they specify which bits they wont to read, and sign documents swearing they wont tell anybody what they have read, and while they are reading it they can take the documents out of the room.

Given what we do know about the history of "free trade" agreements and their economic effects, and more specifically the leaked chapters of this agreement it hard to understand why any country with an advanced economy would willingly sign up to this pig in a polk.  If this thing is so good, why the secrecy? Any one would be forgiven for thinking there was some chance that if we understood what was in it, we might hate it more than the oh so suspicious secrecy which it has surrounded it.

For working people in advanced economies like New Zealand and USA, the biggest threat comes in the form of investment mobility, what this means, investment capital will be more freely movable to low wage economies, meaning that higher wage economies will manufacturing workers toss into the street to scrape for the jobs in the wonderful world of minimum wage service industries which are pushing for no minimum wage, while offering zero hour contracts and precarious employment. This is get that step too far, after 30 years of neoliberal economics, which has only offered a plentiful supply of empty promises, while delivering the wealth created by working people to the top 10% of income earners. Just how perverse this situation has become, was recently well summerized Bill Maher (See here at Raw Story).

See also
  3News
  One News

Drop Dead Fred and Thank you for your cooperation.

Finally at age 84, Fred Walden Phelps Sr, Founder of the Westboro Baptist Church is dead.
Mourned by few outside his cult, with the possible exceptions close family with stockholm syndrome his death sees the end of a twisted tale of abuse, bigotry and public ridicule.
In the manner of the pot calling the kettle black, Jerry Falwell in 2007 described Fred as a "first class kook", coming from a man who once claimed that a hurricane, I forget which one, happened because his god was pissed at Americas gay community.

Associated Press

Somewhere along the way he lost plot, he was once a civil right lawyer in the fight for black civil rights but things went strange when he sued a court clerk after they failed to get court paper to him on time. After that the breaks  on his "road to hell" journey.
It's thought his family excommunicated him for the crime of dying before Armageddon, form which they infer he is indeed Hell bound.

A deeper look

This has got to be big news, perhaps our first glimpse behind the cosmic firewall which obscures our view to about 13.5 billion light years. Prior to that point photons were scattered by dissociated protons and electrons, rendering the universe effectively opaque and once the universe cooled enough, the electromagnetic force was able to overcome the energy levels and hold electrons and protons together as hydrogen, allowing the universe to become transparent.
This makes it impossible to see the earliest moments of the universe directly, but this week it appear the first crack in the cosmic veil of secrecy has  appeared. It comes in the form of polarity shifts that are observable as altered polarity in the CMB radiation. Theoretical work suggested that gravity wave from the earliest moments of the universe could affect the polarity of light that form the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation.
Observers in Antarctica, have seen twists in the CMB that seem to approximate some predictions of this earlier theoretical work.
This is also the first time we have seen evidence of the gravity waves that were predicted by Einstein. It may also be a big step toward a grand unified field theory for explaining the for fundamental forces of nature, the strong nuclear force, the weak nuclear force, electromagnetic force, and the wascally wabbit of them all, gravity.

See also
   Washington Post
   Forbes
   Chicago Tribune
   New Yorker
   New Scientist

Not A sad farewell...

No, it's not a video capture from Walking Dead

Nate Phelps son of Westboro Baptist Church founder Fred Phelps, reports that his father is gravely ill and is near death. This news leaves him conflicted, while sorry for all the hurt and anguish Fred has put himself, the rest of his family, and many others through, it comes with a sense of relief the Fred will no longer be able to offer the world the venom of Mosaic Law. Fred is still his father, and that means some sadness for a lost chance to reconcile.
Fred's life is in a sense a monument to poison of religious belief. Fred's adopted positions made himself and his family not only the pariahs of a nation but a laughing stock of a world that understands compassion reason, science and respect for the grieving. Even GW was forced to act to reign in the antics of this "first class nut" (Jerry Falwell 2007). His beliefs also led to abuse within his family.
Some 20 members of the family escaped in 2004, perhaps this great family rift can be put down to Fred's dogmatic understanding of the ancient and savage text.
So with the respect Fred has due and on behalf of the many families he and his family picketed, I bid him farewell as apropos. So long sucker - you won't be missed.

A brain on religion is a truly hideous thing. What good might he have done had he not been infected by this terrible infection of the mind.

See also
  The Daily Kos
  patheos

Does John Campbell's coverage of Noble Bob Douglas's "some success" mean an about face?

Still green Mr Campbell?

Tonight a story presented by John Campbell has caught the ire of some hardworking folks fighting to keep our local environment a fit place for New Zealander's to prosper, calling into question the direction John Campbell may be taking his coverage of the issues.

This story is introduced as a quick update, and at about 3 minutes 4 seconds, it is likely a story that was squeezed in last minute, these things happen in news cycles. Early in this story on tonight's programme John Campbell's item points to the impressive piece of technology that is the exploration ship (Ig)Nobel Bob Douglas , so impressive it costs $1m/day to run. Impressive, yes, it is. Virtuous, hardly, but that was not mentioned in the clip.

The piece mainly focuses on opinions in Raglan while the introduction does mention that Raglan gets the bulk of the risks, and few of the benefits. Lines like "And not always sitting the newly lawful distance away." allude to the dodgy Mining and Resources Act clause introduced last year. "In short Raglan gets the environmental risk, although it would have to be a catastrophic spill to reach here, without the direct economic benefit Taranaki would enjoy."

One person interviewed, talked about how as consumers people like himself are part of the "problem". He seemed ambivalent about the value of Anadarko's exploration in New Zealand. Odd logic really, even an addict committed to recovery can understand and say rehab is good and understand that their supplier should be kept at some distance. And their are viable alternatives, it is just a matter of developing the scale. Ethanol+vegetable oil -> esters (aka bio diesel), runs nicely in a diesel motor with a little tuning. To be fair, it is easy to find people who haven't quite thought things through, or are not fully acquainted with the available options. Jo Averge with a mic shoved in his face rarely the thoughtful creature they are in more pensive moments.

Another person, was enthusiastically in favour  of exploration. Which is still a position held by more than one third of the public, though that number is falling. Clearly the position of the unrepentant addict, like the boozer that says "It's only few. I'm just being social. I'm not hurting anyone."

And the last person, essentially noted that the oil company staff wont have anything to do with Raglan and that "it would do Raglan no good at all." This makes a very good point that Raglan and much of the country will see little benefit from exploration. Our royalties are among the cheapest in the OECD, the government's role in this deal is like a dip-sh*t dad that opens to two men who "We're burglars, we've come to do your house." To this, the dad says "Sure fellas, will it take long? The wife will be home in thirty minutes."

One person noted how the jobs were highly specialized and that he did not know anyone in the industry.  Which does bring forth the issue, that while the industry will create jobs, they will not be filled from our local work force, but from imported expertise.

The (ig)Noble Bob douglas is reported to have had "some success". Which suggests oil or gas were found. While a full report is expected on Wednesday, the signal can for now represent at least three possibilities.

Worst case: They found oil or gas at commercially viable pressure,  which means the carbon addicts will be back to get their fix, putting our local environment at risk and putting the global climate deeper into chaos, destabilization and extreme weather.

Best case: They found oil or or gas at very low pressure making extraction non viable. In which case, Anadarko so nice to see you leave.

In the middle - but still very bad, the pressure is low, but high enough that pumping water into to the reserve will mean that they still make a profit from extraction even though  it will cost them. Extraction may even involve fracking.

This analysis was not offered during the coverage of the story. Perhaps as a breaking story there wasn't enough time to prepare an analysis or time in the show to present it.

I note that John Campbell is a journalist, an item like this is news. And so he reported it. While he seemed a little too excited in reporting the story, the question remains is that because he's reporting a big news item on a big issue(a journo's wet dream) or because he now thinks the find is a good thing, is faking it under instruction, or is just rushing to get through it in 3 minutes. He also pointed to some risks of the exploration. To some extent it could be considered he said/she said fake balance coverage, if you miss his somewhat non specific pointing to the risks that Raglan faces. Risks that John Campbell's audience should by now be quite familiar with.

If there is an about turn in Campbell Live's coverage of the issue, I don't see it. It would be an important shift, that I would hope not to see. But if someone can show me evidence of such a shift I'd like to see it. Such things are not unheard of and now that they've found what they are looking for, it is possible that they just dropped a big advertising contract on MediaWork's sales desk. But I need more evidence in order to accept that a U-turn has taken place.

Can we  see Simon Bridges loosing his cool on the show again - now that is what I call full disclosure.

See also
    Campbell Live reports Anadarko's  "some success" drilling off Taranaki.

ADDENDUM 4-FEB-2014
It appears that while a possible imbargo may have been in place last last as Campbell Live reported "some success" in a story titled "Has Anadarko found oil of the coast of Taranki?" Any gleeful body language might be attributable to knowing that Anadarko came up empty-handed. Apparently "some success" means "We drilled and it didn't blow up in our faces." And that is oil industry success I can live with.

But they are still exploring, and heading to a site off the Otago coast. I''m hoping for similar results. After that there is the Pegasus Basin site off the Kaikoura coast where MV Duke is engaged in seismic testing, deafening whales dolphin etc. But surely who would question a large multinational trying to make a buck  while #$%@ing the wildlife that drives existing local industry. Anyone with a thought in their head I would say, but I'm crazy like that.

Hey Hey ho ho, Anadarko's got to go.

It has been an event filled week in Wellington. First the MV Duke slipped quietly into port at 12 noon on Friday and 30 minutes later a rally marched from Midland Park to the Todd building where Anadarko's offices are located. The Rally had been scheduled for over a wee, so let's not have right wing conspiracy nuts making fools of themselves claiming the harbour was being watched and the whole thing was organized in ten minutes. Cool as it would to be able to plan an action involving an estimated 800 people like that, it just did not happen that way. On second thoughts, I enjoy watching buffoon's be idiots, I get the biggest laughs from Pat Robertson, Bryan Fischer (2013 Dim bulb of the year), Colin Craig and Simon Bridges.

Various protests designed to send the message. The message that Anadarko's "legitimate" business is not welcome in the Wellington are expected. For ethical reasons we can't use DGSE frogmen. But, oh - the irony. Anyway street theatre, and promoting public debate are more effective. Polls are saying that "don't knows" are migrating to the "too risky" camp pretty fast. There is good reason for that.

At a rally on Friday, Regional Councillor Paul Bruce spoke of the regional Councils letter to the government that any disaster from the Pegasus Basin exploration would surely have consequences in areas for which they were responsible creating a situation they are distinctly ill equipped and under-resourced to handle, asking that no such exploration put the region at such risk.

Gareth Hughes of the Green party spoke of how Anadarko's own executives admit that it would be at least 80 days before capping operations could begin after a gusher. Citing how Maritime New Zealand were so useless in the wake of the Rena grounding that kids with buckets and spades were more effective.

Exploratory drilling is the most dangerous phase of the extraction process, oil and gas under pressures of the order of 2000 atmospheres can be encountered. These cause blow outs like that seen at Deepwater Horizon.

We rely rather more heavily on fishing than the US spill will devastate our fishing industry. Kaikoura Whale Watch would also be hard it, perhaps even destroyed. Look out for more whale strandings. Seismic testing can damage the sonar of Whales and dolphins for quite some distance as sonic energy from the explosions remains dangerously loud over distance because water is 800 times denser than air.

Vapours from a West coast spill may affect agriculture, as is reported to have happened in Florida as off gassing dissolves into water vapour at sea and later falls as acid-rain.

There is no safe deep-sea drilling there is already too much carbon in the extractive industries' plans, 5 times too much.

So yeah, Hey hey ho ho Anadarko's got to go.